Things Worth Remembering The three habits that lead to success are: Patience, Application, and Vision.
Take care: The person who will tell others' faults to you - will tell yours to others.
It is always better to be underestimated.
There are three things that are better than riches: Health, Freedom, and Honor.
Think swiftly, speak softly, act wisely.
"The world is neither Scottish, English, nor Irish, neither French, Dutch, nor Chinese, but human, and each nation is only the partial development of a universal humanity." - James Grant on founding the National Association for the Vindication of Scottish Rights, 1862
All from: The Book of Celtic Wisdom
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Obi-Wan: “Captain Typho has more than enough men downstairs. No assassin will try that way. Any activity up here?”
Anakin: “Quiet as a tomb. I don’t like just waiting here for something to happen to her.”
Star Wars II: Attack of the Clones
Please forgive the crazy delay. I popped in today and noticed that my last post was on July 4th. A month and a half. Geez.
So, you see here’s the thing. I got a job. A full-time job. A really full-time, on my feet all day long on a concrete floor job. A this was supposed to be a part-time, up-to-20 hours a week, filler position job, but after six days spread out over two weeks I was offered the position of store manager on July 8. A full-time, at least 40 hours a week job. Well, holy cow. I said yes, took over on July 9, and it’s been a crazy rollercoaster ever since. Have I mentioned that it’s been way too many years since that kind of non-stop on-the-go activity has been a regular part of my life? I have learned a new level of both exhaustion and sore foot pain.
On the up side, I love this job. Love, love, love it. It’s fun, it’s positive, and it’s close enough to walk or bike to. The women I work with are fun and hardworking (a great combo), the challenges are enough to keep my brain pumping along, and the feedback from my employers and customers regarding the changes I’ve been implementing have been uniformly positive.
Many other things have been happening as well these past couple of weeks.
Padawan Learner turned 16 this summer, is driving around town by himself, started back to school at 5 out of the 8 periods (and is picking up a 6th period geometry class starting on Monday) and has been pleased with his newfound freedom. It’s a little weird, but we’re both enjoying the break from each other 24/7. He’s very 16, and I’m definitely a mom. Clashes have ensued. He’s talked about getting a job and working toward becoming independent sooner rather than later. It could be a good idea, but we’ll see how much effort he puts into meeting that goal. As you know quite well, there’s more to being a grownup than earning an income.
PL went to two different camps this summer, a week long half day parkour camp in Boulder. So PL got to participate in one of his most favorite activities ever AND we got to visit with our nephew who just moved into the area a few months earlier. I think he enjoyed our visit too since he was forced to learn first hand about lots of great restaurants in the area. PL also went to a week long overnight camp (his first experience with that type of program) for trampoline and double mini in Michigan, so Dad Windu and I were able to visit some old friends from different parts of Michigan – including some that we hadn’t been able to see for years.
To round the summer out, our niece married, rather unexpectedly but apparently happily, and we were all able to gather once again as an extended family (minus 3) for a long weekend. But it seems that with joy comes pain, and this weekend was no different – DW’s co-worker was in a motorcycle-car accident on the way home the same day we left for MI and was airlifted to a hospital near us. Thankfully he had on his leathers and a helmet (a rarity in Iowa). Still, he has two broken legs, a broken arm, and bleeding in the brain (now stopped), but he survived the first night (a major event) and is on the mend. He is such a sweetheart and such a fighter. I’ve been able to go sit with him in the mornings while his wife gets their four kids off on two different school busses (two hours apart!) so that he doesn’t have to wake up alone. The good drugs are giving us really fun conversations. It’s so nice seeing his bruises go down day after day, but it’s heartbreaking to see the pain that goes along with all the things that will ultimately make him better – multiple surgeries and their subsequent swelling most of all. Send any extra good thoughts along to JerBear.
So there you have it. Sorry for making you wait for an update.
Darth Vader: “What is thy bidding, my master?”
Emperor: “There is a great disturbance in the Force.”
Darth Vader: “I have felt it.”
Emperor: “We have a new enemy, Luke Skywalker.”
Darth Vader: “Yes, my master.”
Emperor: “He could destroy us.”
Darth Vader: “He’s just a boy. Obi-Wan can no longer help him.”
Star Wars V: The Empire Strikes Back
Ah, but the Emperor knew what Darth Vader had not yet fully begun to grasp. The acquisition of knowledge is a powerful ally against the Dark Side of life.
Padawan Learner’s first year of high school is moving along, and I find that I need to cull the homeschooling shelves again. That can only mean one thing, a few more additions to the Watto’s Junk Shop page. If you see anything you’d like to claim, please just leave me a comment on that page and I’ll forward it to you promptly.
I’ve been fortunate enough to have received cheap and free curriculum from other homeschoolers over the years, and I’m glad to keep the generousity humming along. With this many books involved, a little help with shipping would be appreciated – if you can swing it. If you’re in a bit of a tight spot though, just let me know. I’ve been in that boat before and remember the relief that came when our curriculum needs fell into place.
Note: Comments have been re-opened on that page. Sorry for the mix-up.
Palpatine: “You don’t need guidance, Anakin. In time, you will learn to trust your feelings. Then, you will be invincible. I have said it many times, you are the most gifted Jedi I have ever met.”
Anakin: “Thank you, Your Excellency.”
Palpatine: “I see you becoming the greatest of all the Jedi, Anakin. Even more powerful than Master Yoda.”
Star Wars II: Attack of the Clones
There’s nothing like knowing your kid is off doing something important that you have absolutely NO control over. Not that I have control issues or anything. Me? No, never. Oi vey. I’m a right regular basket case this morning.
Pet Shop Boys, OMD, Modern English, (vintage) U2, New Order, Echo & The Bunnymen, The Cure, Men Without Hats, INXS - I’m filling myself up with the comfort music of my high school and university years on Pandora Radio to keep myself sane. OK, I’ve just seriously dated myself. If I end up cutting my hair asymmetrically and dying it flame red, you’ll know why. Seriously, I really, really want to have flame read hair again. I blame that mostly on Ramona from Scott Pilgrim vs. the World though. (I’m also feeling compelled to dance with several of the songs as they play though, so daily exercise? Check.)
And tea, I’m drinking vats of tea: Santa’s Secret from my dear friend, Eileen Cook. This may or may not be a good idea as it’s packed full of caffeine and has real, miniature candy canes pieces scattered through out the mix, but that’s not going to stop me. I received a Saeco Electric Water Kettle for Christmas and Ho Boy! that thing rocks. Super fast water from the tap to 150-boiling in moments, and with the measurements on the side I can measure out just how much water I’m going to need.
Padawan Learner is taking the first half of his very first mid-term exam today, the verbal Italian segment. I spent all last night saying, “Shouldn’t you be studying for that Italian test?” only to keep hearing, “No, it’s under control.” He glanced over his notes, made a few pretty sounding utterances (strange, I know, but I really miss hearing those guttural G’s from his Dutch-language days), and watching an episode each of The Big Bang Theory and CSI before going to bed. Who IS this child and how could he have ever come from Dad Windu’s and my DNA? I was a compulsive study-freak in school and I’m pretty sure DW was too. I kept thinking – but thankfully not screaming out – “What the blazes does that have to do with anything? ” In the end, I went and finished up my latest library find (Death of a Valentine ) in the bathtub.
I really don’t have reason to worry too much, PL is doing well in his Energy and Italian classes, but I think one of the underlying reasons is that I feel a fair bit of pressure due to the fact that this is his first leap into the unknown of what is commonly referred to as “real school” by family and friends that were not terribly homeschool-friendly in the first place. This semester has felt like it is, in their eyes (and I fully admit that I could be completely projecting my own insecurities onto others here), the proof in the pudding of homeschooling in general and of our homeschool family in particular. How about you other homeschool to traditional school or duel-enrollment folk? Did you experience this the first time one of your kids started thinking inside the educational box?
OK, on to other things now. Like those dust bunnies lurking in the bathroom and under the beds. Time to slay them all.
JerJerrod: “I assure you, Lord Vader, my men are working as fast as they can.”
Darth Vader: “Perhaps I can find new ways to motivate them.”
Star Wars VI: Return of the Jedi
If any of you are using or considering either the Biology: Visualizing Life or Prentice Hall Physical Science: Concepts in Action With Earth and Space Science (with or without the Earth and Space Science component) textbooks, you might be interested in reading further. If not, I’ll turn my head while you click the hateful X in the corner… *sniff*
I love science and find it fascinating, but it’s not my background (“Boys and girls, can you spell English and Counseling Degrees?”) so I’m scouring the Internet daily for relevent materials to clarify these topics for Padawan Learner. It occurred to me that, since I’m keeping a log of our daily lessons online at The Jedi Academy so PL can start work independently as needed and for future transcript needs, there might be others who would be interested in following along as well – and saving themselves the effort (and occassional hair-pulling) of duplication.
Generally, I try to find materials and videos online, but I also include a few Netflix movies. Those resources fall more frequently in the History category, but there are a few science-related ones that we’ve put in our queue. They could, perhaps, be found through your local library, or simply ignored, depending on the library system’s depth and breadth.
This should also go a long way toward explaining why things have been so quiet here lately. I’m a rather poor multi-tasker.
So… if you’re interested, you’re welcome to follow along – either this year or in the future. To science!
“Your feeble skills are no match for the power of the dark side. You have paid the price for your lack of vision.” – The Emperor, Star Wars VI: Return of the Jedi
Poor Padawan Learner. All these years he’s never had to learn to take proper notes from a book, but all that has changed.
With his move into high school classes and his interest in taking a whopper of a class next year (with Biology and/or Chemistry AND Algebra II as pre-requisites), I’m weaning him off the mom-directed manner that used to define how we homeschooled – you know, back before we were unschoolers. (Cue the maniacal laughter for the strangeness of the path PL has taken over the years.)
In past years, I drew up a daily to-do list with everything broken up into little bite-sized morsels of reading, math, and etc. In addition, we previously only used conversational assessment since I find test-taking so limited in its scope. It was easy for PL since he didn’t have to put any thought into how things were going to get completed, and it was lovely for me because I’m an uber planner. Different times require different methods though. As he becomes independent as a student – even making his own lunch the night before school without being reminded – I’m scheduling weekly- and chapter-based readings for the science, history and health-related books that he’s using. That means I’ll still be breaking his math and formal writing topics into 2-3 day chunks, since they require so much participation on my part ahead of time, but he’ll be setting the pace (to an extent) for his independent reading.
What about the note-taking though? Well, part of his independent reading task is taking good, detailed notes from the chapters read. I want to emphasize that: good, detailed notes. Yes, I’m being a stickler on these notes because this skill will be the foundation for any out-of-the house classes he’s bound to take in the future. PL is not enjoying this at present, but I didn’t expect that he would. He hates writing, mostly from lack of practice I do believe. The conversational manner of his education up to this point has been fantastic for comprehension and rationalization skills, but it has done so at the expense of his writing skills. I wrote up some good, quality notes from the introduction of his Art History book to show him an example of what to aim for, and explained that I knew it would take some time for him to get to that point.
I’ve also included section review sheets for his Biology and Physical Science books and will include chapter quizzes, a mid-term test, and a final exam. This is a completely new arena for both of us, but is the reality for the educational setting that he has chosen for the sciences. It would be a disservice to exclude them this year just because I find them so distasteful and limited in scope. We’ll also use the corrected section review sheets as a study guide for chapter quizzes and the larger tests to come. Ah, the skills one learns while taking traditional classes. They will serve him well.
Bibble : “Your Highness, I will stay here and do what I can…They will have to retain the Council of Governors in order to maintain control. But you must leave…”
Faux Queen Amidala : “Either choice presents a great risk…to all of us…” (looks at Padme)
Padme : “We are brave, Your Highness.”
Star Wars I: The Phantom Menace
So here we are, ready for the summer. Internet service is back up and running, which is merely a sign of my weakness and internet-junkie status. My original plan was to put off internet service in the apartment until fall giving us all a chance forcing us to really jump into life in Des Moines. Yeah, I know. Dry your eyes, the tears of laughter sting when they make a path for sunscreen to get into your eyes. The reality is, despite the fact that we have a free (albeit s.l.o.w.) wifi hotspot just below us, we use our wifi connection far more than even I ever realized. Google Maps, search engines, the white and yellow pages for everywhere, community events calendars, weather.com, our Netflix queue, email, Facebook, iCubs game times, coffee shop hours, you name it – we use the internet to access them all.
And to make the siren song of the internet just that much more enticing, we bought an internet ready TV back in early May since our old television set gave up the ghost back in March just a few days shy of Dad Windu’s move to Des Moines. Poor guy made good with our 20 inch (and 20 yr old) set for two months, but it was time for us to get him a Big Boy television set since it wouldn’t even connect to the DVD player and he’d watched all our old VHS tapes (some more than once). So we got a “small” 40 inch, internet-capable HDTV – did you know those things go up to 70 inches now?!?! – on sale and have since plugged that puppy in. Let me tell you how cool the Netflix on-demand feature is, when downloaded directly to your TV set - really, really, really cool.
In unwired news, Padawan Learner and I have joined a secular teen unschooler group. Yes, all three of those words cause me to swoon just thinking about them. I especially like that the group’s definition of unschooler is so fluid. I’ve looked at groups that have real unschooling and not real unschooling definitions, and I find them annoying – ironically – in their rigidity. I have no interest in trying to pass someone else’s unschooling “quiz.” From what I’ve seen, there are teens in this group that go to school part-time and teens who have never set foot inside a school. There are teens who do lessons as they and/or their families see fit and teens who wouldn’t know a worksheet if it jumped up and bit them in the tukus. Teens that take formal classes for something or other and teens that aren’t currently take any outside classes at all. Teens that have home routines, schedules, chores, and – dare I say it … parental expectations in one form or another.
The moms I’ve met are friendly and welcoming, and no one gasped in shock or horror to hear that we’re a family of atheists. Score another one for Des Moines.
One new thing in our homeschooling world is state requirements. Since Michigan is a no registration, no notification and no annual assessment state, the mild to moderate requirements of Iowa seem a bit overwhelming at times. There are registration and notification deadlines – August 26th this year – and testing requirements if not using a supervising teacher. I considered going the supervising teacher route, but decided to just do the pre- and post-year testing instead. PL has never taken a formal assessment test before and I don’t think it’ll be a negative thing for him to go through that type of experience a few times. The initial test, in October I believe, is just a starting-point assessment. In a nut-shell, they just want to know where he’s at “according to the norm” and it will be used to show that he has made academic progress over the next nine months when he tests again in June. Since registration and assessment is only required until he is 16 years old, I won’t be required to jump these hoops after this initial year. While I don’t think it will be a big deal for him academically – he’s a bright boy – I also don’t like being told what to do by a bunch of educational bureaucrats.
For PL, this single round of testing is going to be more of a ACT/SAT warm-up than anything else. If he was going to have a few years of it, I’d likely have gone the supervising teacher route instead. Annual testing requirements get my panties in a twist on principle.
“You must unlearn what you have learned.” – Yoda, Star Wars V: The Empire Strikes Back
Back in the day I was a homeschooling mom, at least that’s what my tagline says. Ok, I’m still a homeschooling mom - or eclectic, non-radical unschooling mom if you prefer that label – but it feels like I’ve let the move take over my life these past couple of months. And it has, to an extent, but not exclusively. I am learning, slowly, to step away from The Schedule and let the learning happen in a more relaxed manner.
In our day to day lives, well maybe week to week lives depending on where we’re living at the moment, Padawan Learner is continuing to explore the world of geometry (which he MUCH prefers to algebra). It’s concrete and tangible and he can readily see it being used in the world around him. And for whatever reason, he loves the fact that all angles in triangle add up to 180 degrees. Simple pleasures.
PL is also nearly through reading Joy Hakim’s A History of US . He’s been going through it in fits and starts this year, but since we’ve borrowed the series he’s making work of getting it read before we leave town. She did a nice job covering the history of our land and the people who have inhabited it. And she did it in a way that doesn’t complete turn most late elementary and middle school kids off. That’s nothing to sniff at. When I read the books, it’s almost like a favored aunt is talking – conversational, informed, slightly gossipy and a bit opinionated at times. We also found overviews that were contradictory in tone and interpretation to make sure that we saw other sides to our nation’s history.
Star Wars ancillary fiction and Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series have taken pride of place in PL’s recreational reading these past few months. It would appear that the doings of Moist von Lipwig (and his none too benevolent over-seer, Lord Vetinari) are just too entertaining to put down. I spotted a new visual dictionary, LEGO Star Wars: The Visual Dictionary , the other day at the bookstore, but didn’t have time to check it out. It might not be something PL would be interested in anymore (although the fun factor might be too high to pass up), but it’s probably perfect for the younger Fanboy and Fangirl set.
Out of time for now. Just wanted to remember out-loud that there’s more to live than moving. See, I’m learning.
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